A technician is performing regular maintenance on a thermal printer in a busy shipping department where labels are constantly printed. After replacing the paper and testing, the technician notices faint printing and poor barcode quality. Prior to declaring the printer as defective, which of the following is the MOST likely maintenance step that should be taken next to address the issue?
Print a test page to check if the issue persists.
Switch to a different brand of thermal paper.
Clean the heating element of the printer.
Replace the printer with a new unit.